Blacking out text with a rectangle tool is NOT redaction. The text is still there — copy-paste reveals it. Real redaction removes the content from the file.
True redaction vs. fake redaction
**Fake**: Draw a black box over "John Smith". The text is still in the PDF's text layer. Anyone with a PDF reader can extract it.
**Real**: Permanently delete the pixels AND the text-layer content AND any metadata references to the redacted information.
What our Redact PDF removes
- Text content (both visual and text-layer)
- Embedded images containing the target
- Metadata fields (author, creator, keywords)
- XMP metadata
- Embedded thumbnails
Common use cases
- Court filings (removing victim names, addresses)
- FOIA responses
- Medical record sharing
- Financial disclosures
Verification
After redaction, we run a text-extraction pass to confirm the content is truly gone. The output PDF is forensically clean.